The Pacific Review

ISSN: 0951-2748 (Print) 1470-1332 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rpre20

Is ASEAN powerful? Neo-realist versus

constructivist approaches to power in Southeast
Asia

Sarah Eaton & Richard Stubbs

To cite this article: Sarah Eaton & Richard Stubbs (2006) Is ASEAN powerful? Neo-realist versus
constructivist approaches to power in Southeast Asia , The Pacific Review, 19:2, 135-155, DOI:
10.1080/09512740500473148

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/09512740500473148

Published online: 16 Aug 2006.

Submit your article to this journal

Article views: 6947

View related articles

Citing articles: 7 View citing articles

Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at

https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=rpre20
The Pacific Review, Vol. 19 No. 2 June 2006: 135–155

Is ASEAN powerful? Neo-realist versus

constructivist approaches to power in
Southeast Asia1

Sarah Eaton and Richard Stubbs

Abstract This paper asks: ‘is ASEAN powerful?’ The argument is made that there
is a divide over this question between two broad groups of scholars who are referred
to as ‘neo-realists’ (including realists) and ‘constructivists’. Focusing attention on
this question is useful because it helps to bring into view three, not always explicit,
points of argument between constructivists and neo-realists in their assessments of
ASEAN. First, the two groups draw different empirically based conclusions about
ASEAN’s efficacy in East Asian affairs. Neo-realists are generally sceptical about
the Association’s role in the region because they view it, along with multilateral
organizations more generally, as peripheral to great power politicking, what they see
as the real stuff and substance of international affairs. A second, conceptual, point of
argument is over understandings of power. For neo-realists, power is frequently used
interchangeably with force and coercion. Scholars influenced by social constructivist
ideas offer a challenge to this equation of power and dominance on the grounds that
power is neither necessarily negative-sum nor limited to conflictual situations. Third,
we suggest that closely related arguments are marshalled by both sides in debates

Sarah Eaton is a doctoral student in the Department of Political Science, University of Toronto.
She has written on the international political economy of international financial reporting
standards. She has lived and worked in China and is currently undertaking research on the role
of business associations in US–China economic relations.
Address: Department of Political Science, 100 St. George Street, University of Toronto, Toronto,
Ontario M5S 3G3, Canada. E-mail: sarah.eaton@utoronto.ca
Richard Stubbs is a Professor of Political Science in the Department of Political Science,
McMaster University. He has published widely on the political economy and security of East
and Southeast Asia. His most recent book is entitled Rethinking Asia’s Economic Miracle: The
Political Economy of War, Prosperity and Crisis (Palgrave, 2005). He has also co-edited (with
Geoffrey R. D. Underhill) Political Economy and the Changing Global Order, 3rd edn (Oxford
University Press, 2005).
Address: Department of Political Science, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario L8S 4M4,
Canada. E-mail: stubbsr@mcmaster.ca

The Pacific Review

ISSN 0951-2748 print/ISSN 1470-1332 online
C 2006 Taylor & Francis

http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
DOI: 10.1080/09512740500473148
136 The Pacific Review

over ASEAN’s future role and organizational structure. Neo-realists argue that a
shift to a more rules-based institutional form is in order, while constructivists place
their emphasis on identity building.

Keywords Power; neo-realism; constructivism; ASEAN.

Is ASEAN a powerful actor in East and Southeast Asian regional relations?

The Association is certainly busy with trade agreements, financial gover-
nance arrangements, and security treaties and conferences but the question
remains: does all of this activity matter? On the face of it, this is a straight-
forward question given to empirical testing of one sort or another. And yet a
scan of the contemporary literature on this topic reveals that there is no con-
sensus among scholars on the question of ASEAN’s power. Indeed, there
appears to be a marked divide over this issue between two broad groups
whom we will refer to in this analysis as primarily ‘neo-realists’ (including
realists) and ‘constructivists’. It should be emphasized that we recognize
that these categories are imprecise, with many analysts being more nuanced
in their appreciation of events than this division of scholars working on
ASEAN might suggest. Nonetheless, we view the distinction as helpful be-
cause the central tenets of each theoretical approach correspond loosely to
the arguments advanced on either side of what is a fairly well-defined debate.
Each of our two categories of scholars has a different perception of the way
in which power is exercised by ASEAN. Neo-realists tend to the view that
ASEAN, as an organization, lacks the capacity either to compel its members
to comply with its own rules or to get its East Asian neighbours to follow its
prescriptions for regional behaviour. This means ASEAN is of relatively lit-
tle consequence to patterns of East Asian relations and must rely on major
external powers, principally the United States, to maintain regional secu-
rity and promote economic development. Constructivists, conversely, argue
that ASEAN forms the nucleus of an emerging Southeast Asian regional
community and is helping to shape an East Asian regional community. As a
result, constructivists contend that the Association is having a positive im-
pact on the development of regional relations. In this analysis we will argue
that scholars on either side of the issue are actually talking at cross-purposes;
that is, they only appear to be looking at, and talking about, the same thing.
At base this empirical disagreement is due to the fact that neo-realists and
constructivists each point to their own indicators of ASEAN’s power because
each defines power differently.
This analysis proceeds in three sections. In the first section, we provide
a brief overview of the arguments for and against the proposition that
ASEAN is powerful on both internal and external measures. The debate over
ASEAN’s internal power turns in good part on the issue of whether or not the
‘ASEAN Way’, or the informal, consensus-building and non-confrontational
approach that characterizes negotiations within the organization, is either
a beneficial or a perverse institutional design. The external aspect of the
 S. Eaton and R. Stubbs: Is ASEAN powerful? 137

debate about ASEAN’s power is over whether or not ASEAN actually mat-
ters to regional economic and security relations. The subsequent section of
this analysis makes the case that two markedly different understandings of
power have given shape to these empirical disagreements. Here we make
use of analyses that point up the subtle workings of two opposed under-
standings of power in political science writing: the first equates power with
dominance, while the second locates power in the ability to act. In the third
and final section, we bring these conceptual issues to bear on the question of
where ASEAN goes from here. Neo-realist and constructivist analyses tend
to suggest different routes for ASEAN’s further development. We explore
these differences briefly.

Divergent assessments of ASEAN’s internal and external power

The question of ASEAN’s internal, intra-institutional power has been a
matter of debate, particularly since the Asian financial crisis. The calamitous
economic effects of the financial contagion that spread through Southeast
Asia after the Thai baht’s collapse in 1997 led many observers to ask: why
didn’t ASEAN intervene to stem the crisis? (e.g. Wesley 2003). Given the
organizations’ informal mandate to promote comprehensive security (which
includes, by definition, the goal of regional economic security) it was entirely
reasonable to ask why the organization did not play a more assertive role in
the crisis. The answer, of course, was that neither the ASEAN Secretariat
nor the members collectively were organized in a way that would allow for
such an intervention. Indeed, on both the economic and the security side of
the Association there were (and are) few centralized mechanisms by which
ASEAN could either enforce agreements struck between members, monitor
domestic events in member states so as to anticipate emerging problems, or
respond to crises involving behind-the-border issues. In the wake of the crisis,
neo-realists identified this lack of ‘pooled sovereignty’ as an indication that
the process-oriented focus of the ASEAN Way amounted to an institutional
design exclusively for ‘fair-weather cooperation’ (Ruland, quoted in Hund
2002: 101).
Similarly, those analysts who focus primarily on security issues in South-
east Asia are most sceptical of ASEAN’s ability to contribute to regional
stability. For example, Emmers, in his instructive review of regional security
in Southeast Asia, notes that ASEAN has recorded a number of achieve-
ments but puts these down to the role of the balance-of-power factor within
ASEAN and the wider world. He goes on to note that ASEAN is unable to
deal with sources of conflict, immediate crises, or ‘where clashing interests
cannot be avoided’ (Emmers 2003: 29–30, 162). For Jones and Smith (2002),
among other critics, the larger conclusion to be drawn about the degree of
ASEAN’s internal power is that the organization amounts to no more than
an ‘imitation community’. The general picture that emerges from neo-realist
critiques is of an ASEAN that is more concerned with process than problem
138 The Pacific Review

solving, an ineffectual talk shop masquerading as a potent regional organi-

zation.
Constructivists, by contrast, have emphasized the positive aspects of the
ASEAN Way, the code of conduct that governs the way in which member
states interact with each other. Scholars who take this view point to the
flexibility afforded the organization by the ASEAN Way, an institutional
form which Acharya defines as a ‘process of regional interactions and co-
operation based on discreteness, informality, consensus building and non-
confrontational bargaining styles’ that stands in contrast to ‘the adversarial
posturing, majority vote and other legalistic decision-making procedures in
Western multilateral organizations’ (Acharya 2001: 64, see also Capie and
Evans 2003). Certainly, it can be argued that the genesis of the ASEAN
Free Trade Area (AFTA), for example, suggests that the flexibility which
the ‘agree first, talk after’ approach lent to the AFTA process was cru-
cial to the expediency of its negotiation and implementation (Stubbs 2000:
313). As well the ‘ASEAN-X’ principle, which permits member states to
opt out of multilateral agreements with the option to re-join at a later date
when domestic circumstances are potentially more favourable, has meant
that politically sensitive multilateral agreements have not been derailed by
the hesitancies of one or more members (Stubbs 2000: 314). One inference
of this position is that a more rules-based system predicated on rewarding
insiders and excluding outsiders may not have been as successful as was the
ASEAN approach in pulling together states at different levels of economic
development.
Jetly makes a similar argument about the advantages of ASEAN’s process-
oriented approach to the negotiation and implementation of agreements on
security issues. She credits ASEAN’s success in conflict management to,
inter alia, the dual practices of ‘reaching consensus through mutual consul-
tations and negotiations’ and ‘diffusing conflict by deferring controversial
issues’ (Jetly 2003: 55–7). On the latter point, she notes that when the or-
ganization was formed in 1967 there were many touchy bilateral security
issues that could have threatened institutional coherence and so hot-button
issues were deliberately left off ASEAN’s agenda in the early years of its
existence. She points out that it was only at the Bali Summit in 1976 that
political cooperation was enshrined in ASEAN because it was only then
that intra-state ‘tensions had subsided and there was a greater will to co-
operate’ (Jetly 2003: 56; see also Wanandi 2001: 26). Also, Jetly notes that
particularly contentious issues between member states tend to be referred
to third-party mediation with the result that several bilateral disputes have
been resolved in the impartial and far-removed forum of the International
Court of Justice, for example. In broader terms, her assessment of ASEAN’s
internal power is that, notwithstanding the many challenges that face the or-
ganization, the neo-realist charge that ASEAN is a failure is an overstated
one because ‘what ASEAN has been able to do is to manage conflict, and
this it has handled rather successfully’ (Jetly 2003: 57–9).
 S. Eaton and R. Stubbs: Is ASEAN powerful? 139

On the related issue of ASEAN’s ability to effect regional developments,

neo-realists and constructivists continue to express conflicting conclusions.
Neo-realists assert that the organization is not a consequential actor in re-
gional security economic affairs. For their part, constructivists counter that
ASEAN has provided a platform on which a region-wide security commu-
nity could take shape. This divide is really an extension of the disagreement
about ASEAN’s internal power. Where neo-realists see an absence of the
means of exercising power and a lack of internal cohesion that, in turn,
negates the possibility of external efficacy, constructivists see a relatively co-
hesive group that has managed to project an influence in wider East Asian
security affairs that is quite out of proportion to the economic and military
capabilities of its Southeast Asian membership.
For neo-realists the key to East Asian security is great power politick-
ing and military manoeuvring to create a stable regional balance of power.
Hence, rather than rely on an ineffective ASEAN, or any other multilateral
organization for that matter, neo-realists look to the United States and its
interactions with the emerging China as ultimately determining the shape
and substance of East Asian security affairs. Indeed, it is not just ASEAN
but all multilateral organizations that are typically accorded a peripheral
role in neo-realist assessments. For example, Michael Leifer has expressed
his scepticism about the ability of multilateral security dialogues ‘to deal
with the problem of power in an ungoverned world’. He goes on to point
out that ‘It is an attempt to deal with the proverbial problem of the balance
of power – the rise of a potential hegemon – by non-military means which is
highly problematic’ (Leifer 1999: 70; see also da Cunha 1996). In the same
vein, although approaching the issue in a slightly different way, Solomon and
Drennan (2001) depict East Asia as a tenuous regional balance underpinned
by a hub-and-spokes system of bilateral alliances linking the United States
to the various regional powers.
Even those neo-realists who adopt a more eclectic approach to East
Asian security downplay the significance of ASEAN in regional affairs (e.g.
Alagappa 2003b; Buzan 2003; Hill and Tow 2002; Ikenberry and Tsuchiyama
2002; Tow 2004). We refer to these scholars as eclectically neo-realist be-
cause although they concede to the constructivist position that East Asia
is more than the story of competing great power relations, their view tends
to be that this form of order, predicated on state hierarchy, is prior to al-
ternative forms of order based on more peaceful, less combative principles.
Alagappa (2003b: 41–3), for example, identifies three pathways to order in
the East Asian region: instrumental, normative–contractual and solidarist.
In simplified terms, the first accords to the realist view of International Re-
lations (IR), the second to the liberal view and the third to the constructivist
perspective. The twist in Alagappa’s formulation is that inter-state relations
are thought to be able to shift upwards from the minimalist instrumental
order through to the more cohesive normative–contractual order and finally
to the trust-bound solidarist formation. The crucial variable in each system
140 The Pacific Review

of order is the ‘relational identity among states’ (Alagappa 2003b: 65). So

Alagappa’s theoretical analysis allows for the possibility of inter-state com-
munity; however, his assessment of present-day security relations in East
Asia suggests that any such form of community in the region is a distant
possibility because few bonds are apparent between regional powers. He
writes: ‘there is virtually no present or future collective political identity at
the subregional or regional levels that would modify or subsume national
identity and interests’ (Alagappa 2003a: 18).
Constructivist scholars, by contrast, accord greater causal weight to
ASEAN in the East Asian security architecture. Acharya (2001: 4) reminds
us that when ASEAN took shape in the late 1960s the ‘outlook for regional
security and stability in Southeast Asia was particularly grim’. Thus, he in-
terprets the fact that there has not been a war between ASEAN’s found-
ing members (Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand)
since then as a sign that ASEAN has been relatively successful in forging a
degree of common identity among its members. To one degree or another
constructivist-minded scholars credit this state of relative peace to the regula-
tive effect of key ASEAN norms, in particular the norms of non-interference,
non-use of force and settlement of disputes by peaceful means (e.g. Acharya
2001; Jetly 2003; Tan and Cossa 2001). In other words, whereas neo-realist
analyses attribute stability to exogenous factors, particularly to the forward
military posture of the United States during the Cold War and during the
1990s in the face of the rise of China, constructivists accord causal weight
to the endogenous construction of a regional identity. Indeed, Acharya sug-
gests that ASEAN resembles a ‘nascent’ Deutschian security community
although with the qualification that its ‘progress towards the ascendant or
mature level looked more promising in the early 1990s’ than it did in the late
1990s (Acharya 2001: 208).
Constructivists also point to the apparently disproportionate influence of
ASEAN in the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), as evidence of the organi-
zation’s external power. Renato Cruz de Castro (2000), for example, offers
an analysis of East Asian security that draws on the neo-realist concept of the
balance of power; however, he departs from neo-realist logic in suggesting
that the ARF, which first met as an initiative of the ASEAN states in 1994,
has bestowed certain ‘political advantages’ on the membership vis-à-vis the
mightier great powers, China and Japan, as well as the hegemonic United
States. Among these advantages he notes that ASEAN has ‘put its imprint
and substance to the ARF’ by inserting the ASEAN Way of informalism into
the institution and embedding in it a comprehensive definition of security.
In addition, he notes that the ARF principle of equal representation in the
twenty-three member organization has meant that ASEAN states now have
a regional role that is quite ‘disproportionate to the member states’ capabil-
ities’ (Cruz de Castro 2000: 69). In a related vein, Tan and Cossa (2001: 35)
suggest that the imprint of the ASEAN Way on the ARF may contribute to
the social construction of a pan-East Asian identity in the future.
 S. Eaton and R. Stubbs: Is ASEAN powerful? 141

Other organizations that also underscore the constructivists’ point about

the disproportionate regional influence of ASEAN include APEC and
ASEAN Plus Three (APT). APEC meets every other year in an ASEAN
country and, with its agenda driven each year by the host country, ASEAN
members have had considerable leverage over the forum’s development. As
for the APT, ASEAN members initiated the regional grouping and each year
the summit meeting takes place on ASEAN soil. ASEAN essentially sets
the APT agenda. And importantly, of course, the APT process has laid the
foundations for possible East Asian identity building (Dieter and Higgott
2002; Higgott 2000; Stubbs 2002). Moreover, the summit meetings of both
APEC and the APT have increasingly discussed security issues (ASEAN
Secretariat, www.aseansec.org; Ravenhill 2001: 222).
Constructivist optimism is qualified, however. Two developments in the
late 1990s – the extension of ASEAN membership to four new countries and
the Asian financial crisis – led to doubts about ASEAN’s internal power and,
in turn, called into question the organization’s future role in East Asian se-
curity relations. Each set of events has been a challenge to the strength (and
indeed the desirability) of the constitutive ASEAN norm of non-interference
(Acharya 2001: 206–7; Acharya 1999). On the first count, the induction of
Vietnam in 1995, Myanmar and Laos in 1997 and Cambodia in 1999 – states
that differ markedly from the remaining six members both economically
and politically – have tested the resolve of ASEAN states to abide by the
principle of non-interference. The decision to extend membership to both
Myanmar (under the rule of a repressive military junta) and Cambodia (fol-
lowing Hun Sen’s coup in 1997) proved to be particularly divisive issues
among ASEAN members (Acharya 2001: 108–20). The division created by
the expansion of ASEAN also appears to have contributed to the inac-
tion of the ASEAN Secretariat during and following the Asian financial
crisis. The lack of cohesion among ASEAN’s members was at least one
of the reasons for the inability of ASEAN to help those affected by the
crisis.
The worries expressed by constructivists about ASEAN’s efficacy, how-
ever, differ in kind from the criticisms levelled at the organization by neo-
realist analysts. Where constructivists see the events of the late 1990s as
challenging an incipient, regional ASEAN identity, neo-realists interpret
these same events as confirmation that the putative Southeast Asian iden-
tity, in fact, never really existed. Certainly neo-realists do not see ASEAN
as being able to significantly influence events either within Southeast Asia
or in the wider East Asian region.

Two understandings of power

In this section of the paper we suggest that the disparate conclusion reached
by neo-realists and constructivists on the empirical question of ASEAN’s
efficacy results from the fact that two very different and fundamentally
142 The Pacific Review

irreconcilable understandings of power underpin these two approaches.

Power, of course, is an extremely complex concept and is open to a vari-
ety of interpretations and definitions. We do not intend to enter into an
extended discussion of the various ways of employing the concept in po-
litical science and IR. Rather, our purpose here is to briefly explore two
approaches to power as a means of gaining a better understanding of the
role of concepts in how different analysts approach the general question: is
ASEAN powerful?

Neo-realist power: structure, capabilities and endemic conflict

The neo-realist approach to power is the more familiar, though its finer points
are often debated among those who wish to advance the cause of neo-realism.
Following in Waltz’s (1979) footsteps, perhaps the central analytical concern
of contemporary neo-realism is with the implications of different global
distributions of power for order and stability in IR. Because an operational
definition of power is necessary to using the theory for predictive purposes,
neo-realists since Waltz often quantify national power in terms of certain
‘power resources’, of which the most important resource is held to be national
military capability (see Baldwin 2002: 177–8). One implication of this usage
is that power is realized in the context of a relationship in which a state
employs its power resources (its potential power) to achieve a specific goal.
In Robert Dahl’s (1970) well-known formulation, power is the ability of an
actor to get another to do what they otherwise would not have done or not
to do what they would otherwise have done. In other words, A gets B to do
X which B might not have done, or not to do Y which she otherwise would
have done. This view of power has been subjected to a series of critiques
which essentially tease out the different ways in which A may persuade or
force B to do X or not to do Y (Bachrach and Baratz 1962, 1970; Baldwin
1985, 2002; Lukes 1974).
For the purposes of comparing what is a fairly well-defined neo-realist con-
cept of power with a still-embryonic constructivist understanding of the term,
it is worth highlighting here two key auxiliary assumptions of this definition
of power: the primacy of the tangible components of power and the relative
gains motive. First, neo-realists view tangible power capabilities as ontolog-
ically prior to intangible factors of power. Waltz (1979: 93) writes: ‘States
are differently placed by their power. And yet one may wonder why only
capability is included . . . and not such characteristics as form of government,
peacefulness, bellicosity, or whatever. The answer is this: Power is estimated
by comparing the capabilities of a number of units.’ Hurrell (2002) points
out that while neo-realists generally acknowledge that ideational forces can
be important to the exercise of state power, norms, beliefs, ideology and the
like are seen as secondary and epiphenomenal in relation to a materially
constituted power system. In effect, ‘changes in the normative structure are
closely bound up with power and the distribution of power’ (Hurrell 2002:
 S. Eaton and R. Stubbs: Is ASEAN powerful? 143

146). A second core assumption of the neo-realist definition of power is that

a ‘self-help’ world means that states have to be worried about relative as
well as absolute gains. In their 1980 debates with neo-liberals, neo-realists
were famously pessimistic about the prospects for lasting international co-
operation for the reason that, as Grieco (1988: 487) puts it: ‘states must give
serious attention to the gains of partners’ because they ‘worry that today’s
friend may be tomorrow’s enemy in war, and fear that achievements of joint
gains that advantage a friend in the present might produce a more dangerous
potential foe in the future’.
In the context of ASEAN scholarship, realists and neo-realists justify us-
ing this approach to power on the basis that not only does it yield sound
analyses but also regional leaders actually bring this perspective to foreign
policy making. Hill and Tow (2002: 162) argue that the realist approach ‘is
still regarded as the predominant outlook held by Southeast Asian security
practitioners’, while Emmers (2003: 6) states that analysts ‘should not un-
derestimate the persistence of realist beliefs among political leaders’ in the
region. For his part, Hund (2003: 388) singles out Singapore’s Senior Minis-
ter Lee as emphasizing the importance of the United States as a partner in
balancing China “‘if we are to have elbow room to ourselves”. Neo-realists,
then, see their analyses as reflecting the policies and mindsets of the ASEAN
members and their leaders.

Conflict is not immutable: the constructivist alternative

to the power/force equation
There are clearly alternatives to the neo-realist definition of power, though.
Insights from IR constructivism in combination with earlier work by Arendt
(1969) and Carroll (1972) draw our attention to vulnerabilities in the neo-
realist definition of power. Further, an analysis of certain key ASEAN insti-
tutions in terms of the principle of ‘regional resilience’ suggests that South-
east Asian leaders are animated not only by the kinds of hard-nosed motives
that realists attribute to them but also by an equally strong ‘competence’ mo-
tive.
Constructivism presents a strong challenge to the neo-realist depiction
of material power capabilities as prior to ideational factors in international
politics; indeed, the main contribution of constructivism to IR in this re-
gard is the insight that tangible things like guns only acquire their poten-
tial power inside socially constructed webs of meaning. Adler (2002: 102)
points out that although, as a research programme, constructivism has only
begun to contribute to debates about the nature of power, the potential
insights of this approach are great because ‘the imposition of meaning on
the material world is one of the ultimate forms of power’. In an early en-
gagement of neo-realist arguments, Wendt (1992) points out that ideational
attributes of structure are a matter of first importance to the nature of inter-
state relations. His essential point is that, contrary to Waltz’s assertion,
144 The Pacific Review

a formal state of anarchy prescribes nothing; rather, patterns of inter-

state relations evolve endogenously out of repeated interactions between
states:

I argue that self-help and power politics do not follow either logically
or causally from anarchy and that if today we find ourselves in a self-
help world, this is due to process, not structure. There is no ‘logic’ of
anarchy apart from practices that create and instantiate one structure
of identities and interests rather than another; structure has no exis-
tence or causal powers apart from process. Self-help and power politics
are institutions, not essential features of anarchy. Anarchy is what states
make of it.
(Wendt 1992: 394–5)

Closely linked to contemporary constructivism is a burgeoning IR research

programme that is focused on the role of norms in international politics.
This line of research lends empirical weight to the constructivist assertion
that socially constructed ideational forces have constitutive, first-order, ef-
fects on state interests and identities (see Hurrell 2002). Finnemore and
Sikkink (1998), for example, present a model of the evolution and influence
of norms in international politics which suggests that, contrary to the neo-
realist depiction of norms as epiphenomenal, powerful states have at times
adapted their domestic institutions in response to international norms that
originated elsewhere in the world. They point out that the United States
and the United Kingdom granted women the vote only after suffrage laws
had been amended in the decidedly non-hegemonic states of New Zealand,
Australia and Finland (Finnemore and Sikkink 1998: 896). In effect, norms
have power unto their own.
This perspective echoes one developed by Arendt (1969). She impugns
the realist view that domination is an ultimate expression of state power.2 In
a significant twist she makes the point that ‘our terminological language does
not distinguish between such key terms as power, strength, force, authority,
and finally, violence – all of which refer to distinct, different phenomena
and would hardly exist unless they did’ (Arendt 1969: 15). Indeed, Arendt
takes the point a step further. She argues that power and domination are, in
fact, opposed concepts. She locates power not in the war-waging capacity of
the state but in the political will generated by social collectivities which she
refers to as ‘living power’ (Arendt 1969: 15). By this definition, the exercise
of arbitrary domination by a central political authority does not in fact rep-
resent a powerful act as is frequently suggested. In Arendt’s formulation,
domination and coercion from above can only erode and destroy power that
grows from below (Arendt 1969: 13–14). She writes: ‘Violence can always
destroy power: out of the barrel of a gun grows the most effective command,
resulting in the most instant and perfect obedience. What can never grow
out of it is power’ (Arendt 1969: 20).
 S. Eaton and R. Stubbs: Is ASEAN powerful? 145

In tones that echo Arendt, Berenice Carroll’s (1972) argument offers an

alternative to the neo-realist depiction of the relative gains motive as a pri-
mary and immutable fact of international politics.3 She begins her analysis by
pointing to an etymological shift in the meaning of a power over the course
of the twentieth century. She introduces two Webster’s International Dictio-
nary definitions as evidence of the change. The first, taken from an early
1970s edition, defines power in terms of ‘a position of ascendancy; ability to
compel obedience; control, dominion’. Clearly this definition resonates with
the neo-realist approach to power. By contrast, the definition taken from a
1933 edition of Webster’s states that power is the ‘ability, whether physical or
mental or moral, to act’ (Carroll 1972: 588). The difference, Carroll argues,
is significant. The 1970s definition is inherently other-referent: ‘ascendancy’,
‘control’ and ‘domination’ all imply that power is exercised by one actor over
an unfortunate other. The 1933 definition is suggestive of alternatives to the
combative vision of power, one that relates actors to their environment and
which does not pit one against others. Carroll fills in this initial hint at other,
concealed, powers with the work of psychologist Robert W. White whose re-
search into the ‘competence motive’ suggests that a basic reason why people
try to become proficient at doing things in the world is because doing things
well is inherently satisfying (Carroll 1972: 590).4 This, of course, stands in
contrast to the neo-realist view that humans and states alike pursue compe-
tence in the interests of getting to the largest slice of the pie first. Carroll
then takes this view of power in terms of competence to the claim that ‘from
this viewpoint autonomy is indeed an objective or a product of power, but of
power conceived as competence or ability, rather than power conceived as
influence in interpersonal or intergroup relations’ (Carroll 1972: 592). Be-
low, we will advance the argument that this competence-based conception
of power finds expression in certain key ASEAN institutions.
Almost in anticipation of IR constructivism, Carroll encourages her read-
ers to turn a critical eye to the common characterization of the international
system as unidirectional. She argues that the common, hierarchical, image of
influence as flowing more or less exclusively from stronger to weaker states
is in fact largely a distortion, and a distortion that is traceable to the now
ubiquitous power/dominance equation. In essence, she suggests that the con-
ceptual narrowing of the term over the century is mirrored in the shape and
substance of research in international politics. She is highly critical of what
she terms ‘top-dogism’, which she defines as an untoward research focus on
conflict between nation-states to the exclusion of the study of peaceful rela-
tions between groups of people (Carroll 1972: 593–7). Carroll concludes her
argument with an identification of forms of power other than the ability to
dominate which so-called ‘underdogs’ are likely to exert in the international
system. Her list of the ‘powers of the powerless’ includes, among others, ‘inte-
grative power’, ‘socializing power’ and ‘norm-creating power’ (Carroll 1972:
608–14). With respect to the last of these powers, underdogs are thought to
originate the ‘most innovative demands and proposals, those that seem most
146 The Pacific Review

extreme and unrealistic because they depart furthest from accepted norms’
precisely because they tend to be less invested in the status quo (Carroll
1972: 611).

‘Regional resilience’ and competence power in ASEAN

Together, Wendt, Carroll and Arendt help us understand power in ASEAN
in terms of the competence motive. From constructivists we learn that con-
ceptions of power, like all ‘social facts’, are not given by a state of anarchy
but are constructed endogenously through socialization processes; hence we
can expect particular intersubjective understandings of power to vary across
time and space. Carroll’s research bears this point out. For present purposes,
then, this raises the possibility that power in the context of ASEAN is a
distinct social construction, one that departs from the ‘top dog’, hegemonic
power/force equation. Indeed, Carroll’s suggestion that ‘underdogs’, or in
Dahl’s formulation ‘B’ states, are likely to be global norm innovators suggests
to us that this is a point worth investigating further. To assess how ASEAN
members view their relation to the wider world, we examine several key
ASEAN institutions and practices which have emerged from the interaction
of the group’s members over the years (Taylor 1979: 88–9, quoted in Manzer
2003: 381). Following constructivist logic, the intersubjective view of power
developed among the ASEAN states will be embedded in the group’s consti-
tutive and regulative norms, which serve to ‘define and regulate appropriate
state behaviour and assign rights and responsibilities regarding’ particular
issues (Bernstein 2001: 5).
A common underpinning of several key ASEAN institutions and practices
is the principle of ‘regional resilience’, a concept that is functionally similar
to the competence view of power advanced by Carroll. Regional resilience,
which Wanandi (2001: 26) identifies as a stated principle of the 1977 Kuala
Lumpur Declaration, is closely related to Soeharto’s doctrine of ‘national re-
silience’. According to Dewi Fortuna Anwar (2000: 82–3), national resilience
has two distinctive features: first, it is oriented towards internal rather than
external threats and, second, it is marked by nationalist sentiment that is the
legacy of a long history of colonialism. If national resilience is realized in the
achievement of domestic stability, regional resilience has a largely parallel
aim. Wanandi (quoted in Dewitt 1994: 4) describes the intent of the principle
as follows: ‘if each member nation can accomplish overall national develop-
ment and overcome internal threats, regional resilience can result in much
the same way as a chain derives its overall strength from the strength of
its constituent parts’. We see in the chain analogy that regional resilience is
both an other- and environment-referent principle. Implicitly a strong chain
is desirable because it is something to draw across the region with which to
keep intrusive forces out. However, the concept is also environment referent
in so far as regional resilience is associated with intrinsic benefits for each
member in terms of political stability and national development.5
 S. Eaton and R. Stubbs: Is ASEAN powerful? 147

Particularly instructive in divining the high value that ASEAN members

place on the principle of regional resilience are two agreements that the
Association’s members negotiated in the 1970s. First, the 1971 Declaration
calling for a Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality (ZOPFAN) initially
sought to have the three major powers, the United States, the Soviet Union
and China, guarantee Southeast Asia’s neutrality but was later modified to
request that the great powers respect the region as a Zone of Peace, Free-
dom and Neutrality (Khaw 1992). Hence, ZOPFAN was an attempt to turn
back the pressure that the great powers were putting on ASEAN members
in the interests of regional autonomy. Second, at the first ASEAN Summit
in Bali in 1976 the leaders signed a benchmark treaty known as the Treaty
of Amity and Cooperation (TAC). The TAC set out five key guiding princi-
ples for the conduct of relations among the member states: ‘mutual respect
for the independence, sovereignty, equality, territorial integrity and iden-
tity of all nations’; ‘the right of every state to lead its national existence
free from external interference, subversion or coercion’; ‘non-interference
in the internal affairs of one another’; ‘settlement of differences or disputes
by peaceful means’; ‘renunciation of the threat of force; effective coopera-
tion among themselves’ (ASEAN Secretariat, www.aseansec.org/1217.htm).
The norms set out in the TAC essentially became the norms associated with
the ASEAN Way and have, by and large, governed intra-ASEAN relations
since 1976. Certainly, both these agreements, along with the practices of
the ASEAN states, demonstrate that the ASEAN members were intent
on employing the Association in order to try to ensure that they gained
as much autonomy as they could. In terms of ASEAN members’ exer-
cise of power, then, it was as a means of promoting regional autonomy,
not in trying to coerce others into action they would otherwise not have
undertaken.
This approach to power underpins constructivists’ assessment that in fact
ASEAN is powerful. ASEAN has been able to reduce regional tensions
and increase regional economic cooperation to its advantage by having re-
gional states sign on to its norms and follow its practices. To be sure, as
realists are quick to remind us, part of what draws ASEAN members to-
gether is a perception of a ‘common fate’ which means, essentially, that they
choose to hang together rather than hang separately in the face of certain
external threats (Buzan, quoted in Nabers 2003: 115). However, we argue
that this is not a sufficient explanation for the evident ‘bindingness’ of the
region. It seems that a good deal of ASEAN’s success is attributable to
the marshalling of competence power in pursuit of the intrinsic aim of re-
gional resilience. The most recent manifestation of ASEAN success in this
regard was the formal signing of the TAC by China and India at the Ninth
ASEAN Summit and the APT Summit in Bali in early October 2003. Since
then Japan and South Korea have acceded to the treaty with, most recently,
New Zealand and Australia also agreeing to sign (ASEAN 2005). With so
many key Asian states agreeing to the TAC principles, ASEAN can quite
148 The Pacific Review

justifiably feel it has set the stage for more stable relations across much
of the region. As Dr. N. Hassan Wirajuda, Indonesian foreign minister has
noted, there are now ‘almost three billion people grouped under the same
rules of good conduct’ (BBC News Online 2003). This is a major achieve-
ment for ASEAN and would seem to be ample demonstration of its power
to act.

ASEAN’s future
What then are the consequences for interpreting power in these two different
ways for the future of ASEAN and its role in the larger East Asian region?
It is tempting to believe that the two approaches could be combined so as to
better appreciate ASEAN’s policies. For example, it might even be argued,
taking up Hurrell’s (1995: 358) suggestion of a ‘stage-theory’ approach to
understanding regionalism, that ASEAN is in transition, moving from its
initial phase in which realism/neo-realism is best suited to analysing its de-
velopment to a new phase in which constructivism is the best approach to
appreciating ASEAN’s evolution. However, while no doubt both neo-realist
and constructivist approaches will be employed by analysts in the future, it
should be recognized that those using each approach will prescribe differ-
ent routes to success and will likely continue to explore different facets of
ASEAN’s activities.
A major difference between neo-realists and constructivists concerns how
to get ASEAN to operate in a more effective manner. Neo-realists argue that
ASEAN requires a greater ‘pooling of sovereignty’ and binding rules that
are policed through sanctions if it is to survive the pressures of a globalizing
world. The logical extension of the constructivist position is that without
having the organizational constitutive norms in place to back up any in-
stitutional reforms, the move to a more intrusive regionalism would likely
not have its desired effect and could, in fact, jeopardize the gains made by
ASEAN in terms of regional identity formation. For constructivists, then,
trust trumps compliance. In other words, despite the institutional limitations
of the ASEAN Way, if these habits, norms and principles are the ties that
bind – and this, it must be emphasized, is an open, empirical question – then
they cannot be summarily replaced by the onerous rules that neo-realists pre-
scribe without some attendant costs to cohesion, to living power as Arendt
would have it.
For neo-realists who hold to the view that the ability to coerce is power,
one of the reasons why ASEAN is not internally powerful is because the Sec-
retariat cannot make a presumably unwilling membership comply with mul-
tilateral agreements. This is made explicit in Hund’s assessment of ASEAN:

The ASEAN Secretariat remains at the margins of ASEAN policy-

making. There are no economic, legal, financial or other regional
regimes and mechanisms that command individual member states’
 S. Eaton and R. Stubbs: Is ASEAN powerful? 149

compliance or have any authority to devise and implement common

policies on their own initiative . . . The picture that results from this
analysis is that of an organization trying to integrate without actu-
ally integrating, of nation states trying to coordinate without being
coordinated.
(Hund 2002: 118; emphasis added)

The inference in Hund’s analysis is that fitting ASEAN with institutional

teeth – establishing mechanisms to compel compliance with agreements in
one way or another – would, by itself, bring about a more unified and thereby
more powerful ASEAN. Hund recommends sweeping reforms that include:
a closing of the loopholes in the AFTA agreement, the addition of teeth to
the Dispute Settlement Mechanism and a strengthening of the autonomy
and capacity of the ASEAN Secretariat. He suggests that without a shift
to a rules-based system that such changes require, ASEAN’s credibility and
relevance in regional affairs are in jeopardy (Hund 2002; see also Akrasanee
and Arunanondchai 2003; Soesastro 2003).
Constructivists take a very different view. If Arendt’s claim that coercion
destroys power is taken seriously, the equation that Hund has drawn, namely
that teeth equals power, must be treated with scepticism. Indeed, if power
lies in the degree of group cohesion rather than in the instruments of coer-
cion (as Arendt suggests and constructivists imply) then the imposition of
specific rules and practices from above without the necessary buttressing of
political will from below could very well have the unintended consequence
of weakening ASEAN. By way of an example, one can point to the slow
emergence of AFTA and argue that ‘a more rigid goal-oriented, rule-based
approach to regional economic liberalization which did not mesh with the
prevailing regional culture would have broken down at any number of points
along the way’ (Stubbs 2000: 315).
This is not to say that constructivists are against a rules-based approach
on principle. Rather, the point is that effective rules cannot be imposed from
above but should emerge from below and fit in with the prevailing norms.
For Hurd the key here is legitimacy, or:

the normative belief by an actor that a rule or institution ought to be

obeyed. It is a subjective quality, relational between actor and insti-
tution, and defined by the actor’s perception of the institution. The
actor’s perception may come from the substance of the rule or from
the procedure or source by which it was constituted. Such a perception
affects behaviour because it is internalized by the actor and helps to
define how the actor sees its interests.
(Hurd 1999: 381)

Rule systems that are perceived by state actors as legitimate may exert a
natural pull to compliance because their very ‘appropriateness’, in March
150 The Pacific Review

and Olsen’s (1998) terms, effectively makes the choice an invisible one.
This is altogether different from rule compliance motivated by either the
fear of negative sanctions or the instrumental pursuit of self-interest (Hurd
1999). Here we also see a close conceptual connection between legitimacy
and identity. Whereas interests in the neo-realist paradigm are assumed to
be exogenous to forceful and self-interested interactions, in the case of le-
gitimacy a state complies because it fundamentally identifies with the ba-
sic rightness of the rule. In effect, the promotion of ASEAN’s legitimacy
through identity bonds is key to the constructivist vision of the organization’s
future.
Constructivists also see identity formation as something that can be ap-
proached empirically and which can be measured in a qualified way (e.g.
Acharya 2001; Garofano 2002; Johnston 2003; Sharpe 2003). The logic of
the approach is simple: if it can be demonstrated that group social cohesion
is increasing as a result of the density and quality of interactions among
members then this bodes well for ASEAN’s future. Ravenhill’s (2001: 219)
observation that politicians, bureaucrats and non-governmental representa-
tives attend over 300 official ASEAN meetings every year strongly suggests
that, in a region of the world in which personal relations are of primary
importance, the stock of organizational social capital is high and helps to
maintain the social cohesion with which constructivists are concerned. If, on
the other hand, identity appears to be on the decline then there are good
reasons to be concerned about the organization’s power.
In looking to the future it is noticeable that neo-realists and construc-
tivists see ASEAN on different time-horizons. Neo-realists tend to look at
ASEAN in the short to medium term while constructivists look at ASEAN
in the medium to long term. To a considerable extent neo-realists measure
ASEAN’s worth against its present inability to coerce other regional or in-
ternational actors. Constructivists, however, by viewing power as essentially
the ability to act in a concerted way, take the long view in trying to assess
where the Association is headed. ASEAN’s role in the ARF and the Asso-
ciation’s ability to steer the ARF so that it can enhance security in East Asia
is reflective of these views. Similarly, on the economic side the Chiang Mai
Initiative (CMI), which is intended to strengthen the economic security of
the APT region by helping to prevent currency crises of the sort experienced
in 1997, is seen by sceptics as too limited and of little value. Although there
are fourteen bilateral swap agreements (BSAs) currently in effect totalling
US$52.5 billion that are intended to provide help in the event of a specula-
tive attack against the value of a country’s currency, no one country will have
access to more than a few billion dollars (Bank of Japan 2005). Similarly, the
ASEAN Surveillance Mechanism (ASM) that goes along with the CMI is
limited in its effectiveness. Yet for a number of more optimistic ASEAN-
watchers, the long-term benefits of state interaction in building up the CMI’s
BSAs, the possibility of pooling the region’s central bank resources to un-
derwrite the BSAs, and the benefits of the exchange of information that has
 S. Eaton and R. Stubbs: Is ASEAN powerful? 151

accompanied attempts to implement the ASM are seen as positive develop-

ments (Manupipatpong 2002: 16). They are viewed as being part of an East
Asian regional socialization process that helps to create regional identity
building while at the same time enhancing the ability of ASEAN members
to act in the face of any future currency crisis.
Yet constructivists do see problems for ASEAN on the horizon. Construc-
tivists (e.g. Acharya 1999) have been among the ASEAN Way’s strongest
critics of the norm of non-interference, for example, which shackles the As-
sociation’s ability to act on key issues.7 And in the future issues such as
human rights and democratic development could certainly divide ASEAN
in terms of the extent to which some members may wish to intervene in the
domestic affairs of other members. Divisions within ASEAN could also be
created by the differences in the speed of economic development of mem-
ber states; a two-tier ASEAN could strain the unity of the Association (see
Hernandez 2001). The increasing number of bilateral free trade agreements
between ASEAN members and states outside of ASEAN and even outside
of East Asia could also divide the Association and hinder attempts to create
an ASEAN economic community. Some of these concerns can be offset by
the signing of the Bali Accord II in October 2003 which pledges ASEAN
to the creation of an ASEAN Community by 2020. However, there are no
guarantees that progress will be smooth or even that this goal will be met.
There are clearly any number of ways in which ASEAN can be divided; its
cohesion jeopardized; and hence, its ability to act gravely impaired.

Conclusion
This paper has sought to shed light on why there is no consensus as to whether
or not ASEAN is powerful. The answer lies in the different definitions of
power employed by neo-realists and constructivists when analysing events
in Southeast Asia. If ASEAN’s actions are viewed through the neo-realist
lens of power as coercion or dominance then the Association is not seen as
powerful. If, however, ASEAN’s actions are viewed in constructivist terms
as the ability to act, including the ability to generate norms that define and
regulate the behaviour of the Association and its members, then ASEAN
can be thought of as relatively powerful.
These competing views of ASEAN also have an impact on how analysts
see ASEAN’s future. Neo-realists will tend to concentrate on what they
see as ASEAN’s attributes that will give it the ability to coerce and mould
its own region as well as the wider East Asian region. Constructivists, for
their part, will emphasize the extent to which ASEAN continues through its
social interaction to develop a set of norms and an identity that will allow
it to act in a coherent manner on specific economic and security issues. This
analysis of ASEAN’s power will not end the debate between neo-realists
and constructivists but it may help to bring into focus what is fundamentally
at issue in the debate as it unfolds.
152 The Pacific Review

Notes
1 This article is a substantially revised version of a paper by Sarah Eaton given at the
first APISA Conference, Singapore, November 2003. Both authors would like to
thank the SSHRC for funding the research reported here and Sarah Eaton would
also like to thank the Canadian Consortium for Asia Pacific Security for providing
travel funding. Both authors are grateful to the ISEAS and IDSS libraries for the
use of their facilities and Sarah Eaton thanks the NUS library as well. The authors
are indebted to Amitav Acharya, Susan Andrews, Alice Ba, Marshall Beier, Brian
Job, Heather McKeen-Edwards, Austina Reed and Grace Skogstad for comments
on various versions of the paper.
2 Arendt sits somewhat uncomfortably with social constructivism because of her
insistence that the ‘social’ and ‘political’ are analytically and, moreover, necessar-
ily separable (e.g. Lane 1997: 145). Nonetheless, we see her views as consonant
with our constructivist concept of power because, like constructivists, she is inter-
ested in exposing the essentialism of the realist claim that endemic conflict is the
outgrowth of an ugly human nature.
3 The continuities in Arendt and Carroll’s arguments are likely not coincidental.
Carroll cites Arendt’s earlier article several times in her essay.
4 A cursory search of contemporary psychology writing suggests that the ‘compe-
tence motive’ continues to be influential. Smith and Anderson (2001: 1043) write:
White’s endeavors in formulating normal personality development led him
to question the view that human motivation is essentially a matter of drive
reduction, an assumption then shared by psychoanalysis and neobehav-
ioristic reinforcement theory. His 1959 article ‘Motivation Reconsidered:
The Concept of Competence’ brought into focus dissatisfactions that were
emerging across a wide spectrum of psychology. It helped to precipitate
the major shift in motivational theorizing that gave appropriate place to
intrinsic motivation toward effective engagement with the environment.
5 Peou (2002) makes a similar point about the essential difference between neo-
realist and constructivist assessments of ASEAN. He suggests that what distin-
guishes Acharya’s work from Michael Leifer’s is that:
Acharya’s main contention is that norm creation and identity building tran-
spire in the context of perceived threats from within and without national
boundaries. Like realists, Acharya still believes that common perceptions
of external threats induced, or will induce, ASEAN’s unity and regional
cohesion. Unlike realists, however, he asserts that community building
within ASEAN also resulted from its members’ shared perception of threats
from within. Both external and internal threats thus gave rise to ASEAN
regionalism.
(Peou 2002: 132–3)
6 Nesadurai’s (2003) analysis of AFTA institutions is suggestive in this regard. Her
research indicates that ASEAN will, over time, evolve into a more rules-based
organization.
7 This view that non-interference is a hindrance to ASEAN is a uniting theme of
Tay, Estanislao and Soesastro’s (2001) volume Reinventing ASEAN.

References
Acharya, Amitav (1999) ‘Realism, institutionalism and the Asian economic crisis’,
Contemporary Southeast Asia 21(1): 1–29.
 S. Eaton and R. Stubbs: Is ASEAN powerful? 153

——– (2001) Constructing a Security Community in Southeast Asia: ASEAN and the
Problem of Regional Order, London: Routledge.
Adler, Emanuel (2002) ‘Constructivism and International Relations’, in Walter
Carlsnaes, Thomas Risse, and Beth Simmons (eds) Handbook of International
Relations, London: Sage.
Akrasanee, Narongchai and Arunanondchai, Jutamas (2003) ‘Institutional reforms
to achieve ASEAN market integration’, in Sharon Siddique and Sree Kumar
(eds) The 2nd ASEAN Reader, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.
Alagappa, Muthiah (2003a) ‘Introduction: predictability and stability despite chal-
lenges’, in Muthiah Alagappa (ed.) Asian Security Order: Instrumental and
Normative Features, Stanford: Stanford University Press.
——– (2003b) ‘The study of international order: an analytical framework’ in Muthiah
Alagappa (ed.) Asian Security Order: Instrumental and Normative Features,
Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Anwar, Dewi Fortuna (2000) ‘National versus regional resilience? An Indonesian
perspective’, in Derek da Cunha (ed) Southeast Asian Perspectives on Security,
Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.
Arendt, Hannah (1969) ‘Reflections on violence’, Journal of International Affairs
23(1): 1–35.
ASEAN (2005) ‘Australia finds way to sign Southeast Asian Non-Aggression pact:
report’, ASEAN Secretariat, Australia-ASEAN-Summit, 05/20/2005 AFP; ac-
cessed at www.aseansec.org/afp/117.htm, 13 September 2005.
Bachrach, Paul and Baratz, Morton S. (1962) ‘The two faces of power’, American
Political Science Review 57: 947–52.
——– (1970) Power and Poverty: Theory and Practice, New York: Oxford University
Press.
Baldwin, David A. (1985) Economic Statecraft, Princeton: Princeton University
Press.
——– (2002) ‘Power and International Relations’, in Walter Carlsnaes, Thomas
Risse and Beth Simmons (eds) Handbook of International Relations, London:
Sage.
Bank of Japan (2005) ‘Signing of the second bilateral swap agreement between Japan
and Indonesia under the Chiang Mai Initiative – second stage’, 31 August 2005,
Annex; accessed at http: //www.boj.or.jp/en/about/about f.htm, 13 September
2005.
BBC News Online (2003) ‘ASEAN deals with Asian giants’, 8 October 2003; accessed
at news.bbc.co.uk.
Bernstein, Steven (2001) The Compromise of Liberal Environmentalism, New York:
Columbia University Press.
Buzan, Barry (2003) ‘Security architecture in Asia: the interplay of regional and
global levels’, The Pacific Review 16(2): 143–73.
Capie, David and Evans, Paul (2003) ‘The “ASEAN Way”, in Sharon Siddique
and Sree Kumar (compilers) The 2nd ASEAN Reader, Singapore: Institute
of Southeast Asian Studies.
Carroll, Berenice A. (1972) ‘Peace research: the cult of power’, Journal of Conflict
Resolution 16(4): 585–616.
Cruz de Castro, Renato (2000) ‘Managing strategic unipolarity: the ASEAN states’
responses to the post-Cold War regional environment’, in Derek da Cunha
(ed) Southeast Asian Perspectives on Security, Singapore: Institute of Southeast
Asian Studies.
da Cunha, Derek (ed.) (1996) Southeast Asian Perspectives on Security, Singapore:
Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.
Dahl, Robert (1970) Modern Political Analysis, New York: Prentice-Hall.
154 The Pacific Review

Dewitt, David (1994) ‘Common, comprehensive, and cooperative security’, The

Pacific Review 7(1): 1–15.
Dieter, Heribert and Higgott, Richard (2002) ‘Exploring alternative theories of eco-
nomic regionalism: from trade to finance in Asian co-operation?’, Review of
International Political Economy 10 (August): 430–54.
Emmers, Ralph (2003) Cooperative Security and the Balance of Power in ASEAN
and the ARF, London: Routledge.
Finnemore, Martha and Sikkink, Kathryn (1998) ‘International norm dynamics and
political change’, International Organization 52(4): 887–917.
Garofano, J. (2002) ‘Power, institutions, and the ASEAN Regional Forum: a security
community for Asia?’, Asian Survey 42(3): 502–21.
Grieco, Joseph M. (1988) ‘Anarchy and the limits of cooperation: a realist critique of
the newest liberal institutionalism’, International Organization 42(3): 485–507.
Hernandez, Carolina G. (2001) ‘Challenges for society and politics’, in Simon S.
C. Tay, Jesus P. Estanislao and Hadi Soesastro (eds) Reinventing ASEAN,
Singapore: ISEAS.
Higgott, Richard (2000) ‘Regionalism in the Asia-Pacific: two steps forward, one
step back?’, in Richard Stubbs and Geoffrey R. D. Underhill (eds) Politi-
cal Economy and the Changing Global Order, Toronto, Oxford University
Press.
Hill, Cameron J. and Tow, William T. (2002) ‘The ASEAN Regional Forum: mate-
rial and ideational dynamics’, in Mark Beeson (ed) Reconfiguring East Asia:
Regional Institutions and Organizations after the Crisis, London: Routledge-
Curzon.
Hund, Markus (2002) ‘From “Neighbourhood Watch Group” to Community? The
case of ASEAN institutions and the pooling of sovereignty’, Australian Journal
of International Affairs 56(1): 99–122.
——– (2003) ‘ASEAN Plus Three: towards a new age of pan-East Asian regionalism?
A skeptic’s appraisal’, The Pacific Review 16(3): 383–418.
Hurd, Ian (1999) ‘Legitimacy and authority in international politics’, International
Organization 53(2): 379–408.
Hurrell, Andrew (1995) ‘Explaining the resurgence of regionalism in world politics’,
Review of International Studies 21 (October): 331–58.
——– (2002) ‘Norms and ethics in International Relations’, in Walter Carlsnaes,
Thomas Risse and Beth Simmons (eds) Handbook of International Relations,
London: Sage.
Ikenberry, G. John and Tsuchiyama, Jitsuo (2002) ‘Between balance of power and
community: the future of multilateral security cooperation in the Asia Pacific’,
International Relations of the Asia Pacific 2: 69–94.
Jetly, Rajshree (2003) ‘Conflict management strategies in ASEAN: perspectives for
SAARC’, The Pacific Review 16(1): 53–76.
Johnston, Alastair Iain (2003) ‘Socialization in international institutions: the ASEAN
way and International Relations theory’, in G. John Ikenberry and Michael
Mastaduno (eds) International Relations Theory and the Asia-Pacific, New
York: Columbia University Press.
Jones, David Martin and Smith, Michael L. R. (2002) ‘ASEAN’s imitation Commu-
nity’, Orbis 46(1): 93–109.
Khaw Guat Hoon (1992) ‘The evolution of ASEAN’, in K. S. Sandhu, Sharon
Siddique, Chandrun Jeshurun, Ananda Rajah, Joseph L. H. Tan and Pushpa
Thambipillai (compilers) The ASEAN Reader, Singapore: Institute of South-
east Asian Studies.
Lane, Ann M. (1997) ‘Hannah Arendt: theorist of distinction(s)’, Political Theory
25(1): 137–59.
 S. Eaton and R. Stubbs: Is ASEAN powerful? 155

Leifer, Michael (1999) ‘North America and the Asia Pacific region in the 21st cen-
tury: changing rules of engagement’, in K. S. Nathan (ed.) North America and
the Asia-Pacific in the 21st Century: Challenges and Prospects for Cooperative
Security and Prosperity, London: ASEAN Academic Press.
Lukes, Steven (1974) Power: A Radical View, Basingstoke: Macmillan.
Manupipatpong, Worapot (2002) ‘The ASEAN surveillance process and the East
Asian Monetary Fund’, ASEAN Economic Bulletin 19(1): 111–22.
Manzer, Ronald (2003) Educational Regimes and Anglo-American Democracy,
Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
March, James G. and Olsen, Johan P. (1998) ‘The institutional dynamics of interna-
tional political orders’, International Organization 52(3): 855–85.
Nabers, Dirk (2003) ‘The social construction of international institutions: the case of
ASEAN + 3’, International Relations of the Asia-Pacific 1(1): 113–36.
Nesadurai, Helen E. S. (2003) Globalisation, Domestic Politics and Regionalism: The
ASEAN Free Trade Area, London: Routledge.
Peou, Sorpong (2002) ‘Realism and constructivism in Southeast Asian security stud-
ies today: a review essay’, The Pacific Review 15(1): 119–38.
Ravenhill, John (2001)APEC and the Construction of Pacific Rim Regionalism,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Soesastro, Hadi (2003) ‘Towards an ASEAN Economic Community’, in Sharon
Siddique and Sree Kumar (eds) The 2nd ASEAN Reader, Singapore: Insti-
tute of Southeast Asian Studies.
Solomon, Richard H. and Drennan, William M. (2001) ‘Conclusion: forward to the
past?’, in Sheldon Simon (ed) The Many Faces of Asian Security, Lanham, MD:
Rowman & Littlefield.
Sharpe, Samuel (2003) ‘An ASEAN way to security cooperation in Southeast Asia?’,
The Pacific Review 16(2): 231–50.
Smith, M. Brewster and Anderson, James William (2001) ‘Robert W. White (1904–
2001)’, American Psychologist 56(11): 1042–3.
Stubbs, Richard (2000) ‘Signing on to liberalization: AFTA and the politics of re-
gional economic cooperation’, The Pacific Review 13(2): 297–318.
——– (2002) ‘ASEAN Plus Three: emerging East Asian regionalism?’, Asian Survey
42 (May/June): 440–55.
Tan, See Seng and Cossa, Ralph A. (2001) ‘Rescuing realism from the realists: a
theoretical note on East Asian security’, in Sheldon Simon (ed) The Many
Faces of Asian Security, Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
Tay, Simon S. C., Estanislao, Jesus P. and Soesastro, Hadi (eds) (2001) Reinventing
ASEAN, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.
Tow, Shannon (2004) ‘Southeast Asia in the Sino-US strategic balance’, Contempo-
rary Southeast Asia 26(3): 434–59.
Waltz, Kenneth N. (1979) Theory of International Politics, Reading, MA: Addison-
Wesley.
Wanandi, Jusuf (2001) ‘ASEAN’s past and the challenges ahead: aspects of politics
and security’, in Simon C. Tay, Jesus P. Estanislao and Hadi Soesastro (eds)
Reinventing ASEAN, Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.
Wendt, Alexander (1992) ‘Anarchy is what states make of it: the social construction
of power politics’, International Organization 46: 391–425.
Wesley, Michael (2003) ‘The Asian crisis and the adequacy of regional institutions’,
in Sharon Siddique and Sree Kumar (eds) The 2nd ASEAN Reader, Singapore:
Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.